The Gayngs debacle was about the only blemish on last weekend's sunshiny Austin City Limits Festival, which in past years had been plagued with near-apocalyptic weather. Headliners at the eighth annual Texas mega-fest included Phish, Muse, the Strokes, M.I.A. and the Eagles. Yes, those Eagles. None was as memorable as these acts:
1 LCD Soundsystem. If its Oct. 23 gig at Roy Wilkins Auditorium is anything like last weekend's set, it could be the best rock show of the year. The New York dance-rockers turned a grassy Austin park into an ocean of rocking bodies even without playing their best number ("North American Scum," a song that might get them lynched in Texas).
2 The Black Keys. Their afternoon set was swarmed (and sonically smothered) by the most bulging crowd of the fest, but the 2,000 lucky fans who caught their after-party at Stubb's Bar-B-Q could clearly hear how successful the duo's transformation into a four-piece has become.
3 The Black Lips. Georgia's retro-styled psychedelic garage band delivered the most straight-up, guns-a-blazing, hard-rocking set of the weekend -- and just as the temperature peaked near 90, no less.
4 Blind Pilot. Pals of the Decemberists from Portland, Ore., they played elegant, string-plucking indie-folk that felt as cozy as the shade under Austin's giant oak trees.
5 Kings Go Forth. The acidic, funky Milwaukee big band turned the gospel/blues/ world-music tent into a sweltering dance party, prompting several Texans to marvel over the fact that Wisconsin could produce an Afrocentric band, much less a killer one.
6 Snide T-shirt. Texas' only liberal city sure knows how to poke fun at the burgeoning Tea Party, but this shirt really stood out for its timeliness: "I hate the [expletive] Eagles."
CHRIS RIEMENSCHNEIDER
